Shy and Carmen labored up the stairs, toward the penthouse on the twelfth floor. He’d spent the last two hours at the restaurant with everyone, doing nothing more than eating and resting and thinking, but it hadn’t seemed to give him a whole lot more strength. He was already out of breath and there were still seven flights to go. He made himself a promise: the second he got on the research ship he’d find himself a bed, or a cot, or even just a spot on the floor, and he’d let himself sleep for twelve straight hours.
“So someone’s actually guarding the doors?” he asked Carmen.
She nodded. “A few of the guys take shifts. But don’t get all nervous, they’re only passengers. And a few people who worked at the hotel.”
Shy didn’t see what the big deal was. Especially if he and Addie were supposedly protected by their shot of vitamins. And someone had to make sure the sick people knew the plan, right? They were leaving in two hours. And how were they going to get down to the water? He wasn’t so sure he trusted anyone right now.
Mostly, though, Shy just wanted an excuse to visit Rodney.
As they passed the eighth floor, Carmen said: “So, what are the chances we’ll find our neighborhoods still standing?”
“No idea,” Shy said. “I don’t wanna jinx it.”
“Hearing them talk about it at lunch,” Carmen said, “I don’t know. It made me feel better and everything, but I got the feeling they were holding something back. I mean, you saw the footage in the theater. It was bad.”
“I was thinking the exact same thing.” Shy started assisting his tired legs by using the handrail. “Wanna hear something else?” he asked. “That guy at lunch who said I saved him, he was the dude who was following me all over the ship.”
“Stop it,” Carmen said. “Really?”
“I promise. Me and Kev were doing our sweep, and I heard someone calling for help. I didn’t even think about it at the time.”
“He seemed really appreciative about you helping him out.”
Shy shrugged. “He still creeps me out. I don’t trust the guy.”
As they passed the tenth floor, Shy switched subjects. “So, what’d you and Addie talk about?”
“I just gave her a little nutritional advice,” Carmen said.
“I’m being serious,” Shy said.
“Me too. That girl’s too skinny. She needs protein.”
Shy shook his head. “So, you were checking her out?”
Carmen grinned. “I peeped her out a little. So what?” She climbed a few more steps and said: “Don’t start having some big deserted-island fantasy, okay? We just talked. She told me how you blasted a shark with an oar. And how some injured guy threw himself overboard when you two were sleeping.”
Shy felt the ring in his pocket as they climbed the final flight of stairs. He decided he needed to tell Carmen about Addie’s dad. The picture Addie had found in his room. How he was partners with the guy Shy saw jump off the ship on his first voyage and how there was something seriously sketchy happening on the island.
But just then they reached the top of the stairs and peeked around the corner. Two men were sitting on metal folding chairs outside the double doors of the penthouse. “What now?” he whispered to Carmen.
“Best way to deal with shit like this,” she said, “is to act like you know what you’re doing.” She popped out from behind the wall and started walking directly toward the men.
Shy followed.
Both men stood up at the same time. The heavier, balding one moved in front of the door. The other guy, who was rocking a military flattop, held his hands up and said: “Sorry guys, nobody’s allowed in there right now. Doctor’s orders.”
“Christian’s the one who sent us,” Shy said.
Carmen slowed and put her hand on the guy’s elbow. “We’re supposed to go in there and run them through the launch details.”
“Sorry,” the flattop guy said. “Nobody’s allowed inside. Not even us.”
“It’s for our own protection,” the heavier guy by the doors added. “Plus Larry was just up here talking to them. Christian must have made a mistake.”
Shy and Carmen glanced at each other. There was no way Shy was gonna climb all those stairs without seeing Rodney. “Okay,” he said, turning back to the two men. “I guess it was a misunderstanding, then. We’ll just go back downstairs and tell Christian—”
Shy suddenly shoved his way past both men and pushed through the doors.
“Hey!” they shouted from behind him.
Shy spun around, saw that one of the men had fallen to the floor. Carmen was hurrying past them, too, and they both ran through the hall, into the main living area, where an awful smell hit Shy.
And then he saw.
Fifteen or twenty people were lying on their backs on temporary cots. Their arms and legs tied down. Some of them looked up when they heard Shy and Carmen come into the room. Others didn’t move.
Carmen covered her mouth with her hand.
The two men who had been guarding the door hurried into the room after them, shouting: “You can’t be in here! We’ll all get sick!”
But then they went quiet, too, and stared at the strapped-down bodies.
Shy pulled Carmen by the wrist and they moved from one body to the next, looking for Rodney. The patients were in various conditions. Some seemed alert and shouted at Shy and Carmen. Others had vomit all over their shirts and they moaned and twisted in pain. Others clawed frantically at their own thighs.
A few weren’t moving at all.
“No,” Shy started mumbling as he and Carmen continued through the rows of patients. “No, please.”
The men were after them again, shouting: “We have to get out of here before they come back!”
“There!” Carmen shouted. She was pointing to a cot in the far corner, where Rodney was lying, and they both rushed toward him.
Rodney’s face was turned toward the wall.
His eyes seemed open, but when Shy shook him he didn’t respond. Carmen turned Rodney’s head toward them, and Shy’s entire body went cold. The whites of his eyes were entirely red and fixed on nothing.
Carmen continued shaking Rodney and calling out his name, until Shy grabbed her by the wrists and said: “Let’s go.”
As the men dragged Carmen and Shy back through the room, Shy stared at each body they passed. Everyone in the penthouse was infected with Romero Disease. And some, like Rodney, were already dead.
And they’d been left there to rot.